Shekhar Gupta uses the brouhaha over HRD minister Kapil Sibal‘s urgency to introduce reforms in education and E. Sreedharan‘s scorching pace to complete the Delhi Metro project, to say that the modern Indian mind is chronically allergic to speed and scale, in The Indian Express:

“In our popular culture, the honest, efficient and sincere are stray romantics and, ultimately, losers; a trend you see in the defining movies of each decade. There is a sense of resignation, an acceptance of the inevitability of misery, under-performance, shortages, delays, waste and corruption.

“Only, it is unsustainable at a time when our people are getting younger, more questioning, demanding and impatient. One way or the other, they will refuse to live with this contradiction between what they want and expect and what the system feels comfortable delivering. They will either force a change, or vote with their feet.”